The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • Page 18

18 Arts THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD FRIDAY, MAY 30, 1997 OPERA SHAKE-UP MUSIC Why one job when three will do? Galleries Biennial quickly finds its rhythm Brisbane Biennial Music Festival: Composers' Week BY ROGER COVELL ft iS'Li- 1 Vjg. Jl By VALERIE LAWSON MARIAN Vickery once saw Adrian Collette playing Macbeth on a stage at La Trobe University. She was an English lecturer and he was beginning a stage career which continued as a professional opera singer. They met again at a Carlton dinner party 20 years ago, then not again until the last couple of months in the offices of Opera Australia. There, Vickery, 45, and Collette, now general manager of the company, persuaded one another that the recently vacated job of OA marketing manager should be expanded to the grand title of director of external affairs.

Her appointment to that role, announced last week, means that, again, Vickery has created a monster for herself. She admits that is her style. Why have one job when three will do? Not only has she replaced Craig Hassall as marketing manager, but her arrival has meant the departure of two other men, Anthony Clarke, retrenched as public affairs manager, and Malcolm Moir, who has resigned as development manager. On the surface, it looks as if more blood has been spilt than in Macbeth, more tragedy than in Madame Butterfly, the opera Vickery loved at age 15. But one of her jobs is public relations and, naturally, she was professionally optimistic at home with her whippets at Darlinghurst on Wednesday.

"I've got a real priority to quieten the horses," she said, referring to the staff. The whippets were not about to be quietened and complained until she tucked them up against herself, like anxious children. Vickery, single, lives alone in her terrace crammed with photographs of her father, whom she refers to proudly as Major General His Honour Judge Norman Vickery, once of the Victorian County Court. Her long-term relationship BRUCE JAMES FOR some, the work of Adam Cullen is in the category of an acquired taste. His desperate diagrams scratched on paper and his patchily painted canvases demand patience from the viewer, perhaps perseverance.

Never one for seductive ideas and materials, he's offensively ham-fisted. This is the man who put the faux in faux-naivety. His new exhibition at YuillCrowley is called Special, a word which once implied incapacity, as in a "special and continues to mean cut-rate, as in something being "on Cullen, so to say, falls between these stools, a position his gift for clowning equips him to exploit and shamelessly. Consciously bereft of content as his work seems be, it is also, equally consciously, side-splittingly funny. His nine-minute video, Inappropriate Elation, is Sydney's laugh of the month.

It features footage of a crazily-rocked playground horse, the kind mounted on a single giant spring. Cullen accompanies its jerks and gyrations with a soundtrack of passing trains and children's whispers. Like a stallion in a movie stampede, the horse assumes an epic dimension out of all keeping with its true scale. I also saw for the first time Cullen's gentility, now clear to me as an element of central significance in his work. As if in proof, the diptych, Terms and Conditions, is an aide-memoire for the joker in all of us.

To June 14. Marian Vickery, the opera's new director of external affairs "I've got a real priority to quieten the horses," she says of the staff. Photograph by SAHLAN HAYES chorus, the company itself. I will make a decision if I need a marketing manager andor a development manager once I get in there." And just because everyone' else has been talking of what they would play to comfort themselves this week as they make their exit from the OA, Vickery says she feels like listening to the end of Cosi fan tutte, when the ensemble sings "in harmony about the rough with the smooth, and letting reason National Gallery of Australia in 1985 on a three-year contract as marketing manager, a job she found kept her away from her partner too much. In 1988, she joined Musica Viva as national marketing manager but did not stay long.

She says she was wooed by the MCA. "Initially I resisted but it became rather irresistible. The gallery hadn't a cent and a very small team to raise funds. It was terrific but demanding and we walked out of there skeletons. I left because I was exhausted." with a professional singer fell apart while she was marketing director of the Museum of Contemporary Art.

Vickery, along with 200 others, applied for the advertised marketing job at the OA but told Collette "marketing is axiomatic to fund-raising, to sponsorship and to good communication across the board. That was something I was used to having at my disposal." A Melbourne woman from a high-achieving family (her brother is a Queen's Counsel, her sister an actress and NIDA lecturer), Vick ery lectured in English and Fine Arts at La Trobe and the University of Melbourne, from which she had graduated in 1973. But one day, about to lecture on Hamlet, she asked herself: "Why am I doing this? I would rather be totally insecure and take that leap." "I opened a shopfront gallery in Drurnmond Street in Carlton," she says. The leap in the dark was addictive. After playing with journalism, Vickery leapt over to the Victorian Arts Centre as publications manager, then the Vickery then became general manager of the Garvan Research Foundation, raising corporate money for medical research.

"I had to promote and sell the intangibles of hope and cure." She stayed three years "it was not my milieu at the end of the day," she says. Her priorities at the Opera, where she starts next Monday, are to communicate to a younger and broader audience. "I would like to see more emphasis on selling the shows and the stars, the designers, milliners, MUSIC THEATRE Summertime, any time To be digested slowly Jerusalem. Wharf 1. Mav 28 i i Jerusalem, Wharf 1, May 28 KULTUREShopin Rose Bay is showing Drapery, a suite of colour infra-red photographs by Adam North.

Randwick Racecourse, Coogee and its environs are the sites North examines in this unusual medium, a combination of standard infra-red and improvised processing techniques. It's plainspoken but poetic. Details 9337 6229. To June 7. "HE policy of the Gershwin I estate, iudeine hv the nro- JUST as the first downbeat often determines the character of the music that follows, a festival can let us know its priorities through its choice of opening items.

To its credit, Brisbane's fourth Biennial Festival of Music has put its initial emphasis firmly on creativity with its current busy schedule of recitals, forums and other events in the service of Composers' Week. The first summons to musical action came, in suitably forthright fashion, from the trombone-led sounds of Simone de Haan's Pipeline ensemble. De Haan himself is a formidable player of the trombone, capable of making that magnificent instrument blare or as in one of the newer improvisatory techniques even twitter; and his Pipeline group may have a hand in offering, as its name suggests, a way through a pipeline to the future for serious ensemble music of an adventurous kind. Trombonists were certainly much to the fore in a rousing new piece, The Armed Man, by the Sydney-trained and temporarily Hobart-based Raffaele Marcellino. Based on a famous late medieval song, L'Homme Arme, which commented on the prevalence of armed warriors in a troubled Europe, Marcellino's ensemble piece turns the theme on its head, multiplies and divides it in all kinds of rhythmic combinations and never fails to engage mind and body pulse with the play of its musical patterns.

Jonathan Dimond, the group's bass guitarist, found inspiration for his Horn OK Please in signs on the backs of Bombay trucks, in North Indian rhythmic modes and a desire to cover a wide range of pitches in a systematic and selective way. If you didn't know that, it wouldn't impede in the slightest your enjoyment of its rhythmic assurance and high spirits. Equally, it was possible for Richard Vella, arranging Tango Sleaze and Let's Smng from his music theatre productions, to take advantage of the dance idioms implied in his titles, with their rhythmic friendliness, and at the same time to mix in other elements that took the pieces beyond functional commonplace. Carl Vine's Harmony in Concord made puns in word and sound while filling out in amusing and enlightening fashion, with the help of a prerecorded tape, the imagined ruminations of Harmony Twitchett (yes, that was really her name) regarding the wilder music put together by her husband (the famous American composer Charles Ives), an activity she was rumoured to regard much as many a wife looks on her husband's endless tinkering in the back shed. I don't know how Pipeline's recital, to be followed this week by contributions from Perihelion, Elision, Synergy and other leading ensembles, would illuminate the topic of the festival's first Composers' Week forum: does Australian new music have definable characteristics and a recognisable destiny? The nearest thing to an answer to emerge from this discussion is that we are likely to continue to make something individual out of being a sympathetic clearing-house for indigenous, Asian, Pacific and European music.

Pipeline's vigorous eclecticism would not contradict that idea. Nor would the career of the eminent Paris-based organist-composer Naji Hakim, who is a participant in Composers' Week as well as an ornament of the Biennial Music Festival as a whole. Hakim, Lebanese-born and initially an engineer by training, switched to full-time musical studies at the Paris Conservatoire and showed such brilliance as player and improviser that in 1993 he succeeded the great Olivier Messiaen as organist at the Trinite church. His compositions, as demonstrated for his first recital on a Queensland Conservatorium organ that sounded as if it needed revoicing to suit its new, more confined premises, are full of post-Messiaenic rhythmic variety and fancy and do not lose sight of Hakim's Lebanese origins in showing a firm grasp of French liturgical and Catholic plainchant tradition. He also demonstrated how the renowned French tradition of organ improvisation can work its way confidently through idioms that would have surprised one of his celebrated predecessors in this art, the late Marcel Dupre.

MINIMALISM, its use and abuse, is the subject of a group exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art. Featuring works from the museum's vast permanent holdings and the John Kaldor Collection, Objects Ideas: Revisiting Minimalism is one of the savviest shows in town. No single exhibit sums up the possibilities of the style, or deflates them so literally, as Mikala Dwyer's untitled sequential wall-piece in aqua organza. Sensational. Don't tread on the Carl Andre, however.

To June 22. failed to project its ultra-clever words adequately in the rather muffled Capitol Theatre acoustic). One of the many likable aspects of the performance was the avoidance of any attempt to glamorise La-Rose Saxon's Bess in her first scenes as a dependent, drug-addicted woman. Her affection for Porgy is correctly shown as fitful; her surrender to the fearless but brutal Crown at the time of the Kittiwah Island picnic compels belief and her acting and singing are in convincing balance. Some hollow-ness of vocal tone in Stephen Finch's Crown slightly undercuts the elemental force of his physical presence, which overwhelmingly suggests a power at the opposite extreme from the limitations of the crippled Porgy.

The ensemble of Afro-American principals, many of whom take turns at the leading roles, is strong and takes up the choral virtuosity of the Promise' Lan' episode with a sure touch. If it lacks the extra resonance provided by an additional chorus, that is completely understandable in a touring company. Stefan Kozinski's conducting co-ordinated stage and pit in well-practised manner, and the orchestra, locally recruited, was in promisingly alert form. The production is nothing like the equal of the Glyndebourne Festival staging of a few years ago, but it should not be missed as a first-hand opportunity to visit or revisit a masterpiece in the genre of opera that encourages belief in a living, working and playing community a genre that also includes Wagner's The Mastersingers, Tchaikovsky's Yevgeny Onegin and Britten's Peter Grimes. Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, Capitol Theatre, May 27 BY ROGER COVELL helps to carry the action of Catfish Row might have seemed a novelty in the 1950s; the lighting, despite the impressive credentials of its supervising designer, looks frankly dull.

In the opening scenes, especially, the incidents that help to establish our understanding of its poor southern Afro-American community are not at all strongly profiled. I am still grateful and I hope lots of other people will be, too for the chance to see in Sydney, thanks to Andrew McKinnon's enterprise, a version of Porgy that rings true in essentials and has been put together with a genuine wish to communicate the poetic elation and universal appeal of the opera. The performance, of necessity, uses operatic-style voices, one or two of them not in very good repair. As the Jasbo Brown introduction was omitted, the first musical event after the racy and brilliant overture was Clara's singing of the first stanzas of Summertime. Marlene Villafane looked ideal for the part, but it was disappointing to hear such a pronounced wobble in the voice of a young singer.

On the other hand, Cedric Cannon as an outstanding Jake and Brian Gibson as a reassuringly warm-natured Porgy have voices in firm and robust condition. Ronn K. Smith, spryly and convincingly portraying the agile dope-peddler Sportin' Life, produced a tenor voice of remarkable consistency and slim strength and delivered his It Ain't Necessarily So with disciplined relish (though he I grams printed for the company now in residence at the Capitol, is to refer to Porgy and Bess as an opera by "the I reject that attempt at even-handedness. Excellent as Ira Gershwin's lyrics are, not to mention the dramatic outline established by DuBose Heyward, primacy in authorship belongs beyond all doubt to the opera's composer, George Gershwin. The word opera, too, is important here.

Even though this American touring production has cut or shortened many musical episodes and scenes in the interests of keeping its length within the normal traffic of commercial theatre, what remains is still very different in its strategy of appeal from that of Broadway showbiz. Theatregoers new to the opera as a whole should not expect the steam-cleaned brightness of polish applied to the recent compilation musical, Crazy for You, where each Gershwin number could be exploited for all it was worth precisely because it had no necessary musical connection with the rest of the show. Porgy has an abundance of notable individual songs, but most of them are part of a larger musical fabric; and this is even truer of the many ensemble passages which help to make the work one of the great chorus operas. An ill-wishing reviewer might dwell on the fact that the production at the Capitol has the unmistakable appearance and style of a quick-fit tour staging, designed for rapid mounting in all kinds of places and conditions. The skeletal wooden scaffolding that BY COLIN ROSE WHEN I was a lot younger I thought that theatre and socialism could change the world.

I've long since abandoned the former idea, but still cling to the latter as too, I suspect, does the author Michael Gurr at least on the evidence of his play Jerusalem. This latest STCPlaybox collaboration takes a sympathetic but clear-eyed look at what we can reasonably be expected to do for our community. Vivien Rickman's (Kerry Walker) home is a de facto drop-in centre for the members of the prison visiting group she organises as well as for some of her clients. Vivien's latest ward is Amy (Tammy McCarthy), newly released from prison. Vivien's former husband, Cameron (Roger Oakley), is an old-school ALP politician, a man more given to helping with the unglamorous problems of his constituents than to spouting self-aggrandising rhetoric.

While he has been in opposition, Cameron's support has dwindled and the party apparatchiks are sharpening their knives. The structure of Jerusalem is neatly bifurcated: on the one hand Vivien's sincere, do-right volunteerism on the other Cameron's party politics. Who, Gurr asks, do we think is the more effective? In the author's mirror-image world, Cameron and Vivien each have two lieutenants, with the same two actors playing the four roles. The doubling of parts is my current theatrical bugbear and while I appreciate the economic necessity, it's often confusing. Gurr's symmetrical solution is more ingenious than most but, without costume changes, responsibility for distinguishing between characters rests solely with the actors.

Marco Chiappi is clearly enjoying himself as both the stoop-shouldered prison visitor and the power-hungry political backstabber. Janet Andre-wartha, too, is largely successful in finding two distinct personae. On the other side of the globe, Vivien Food for thought Kerry Walker and Tammy McCarthy in Jerusalem. and Cameron's footloose son Oliver (Simon Wilton) and his partner Nina (McCarthy again) are searching for their own Jerusalem. While Vivien and Cameron are resigned to building their version of a perfect society brick by brick, Oliver is convinced that it already exists he just hasn't found it yet While I think Jerusalem is an impressive piece of playwrighting, I was less convinced by director Bruce Myles's production.

The pace is ponderously slow, particularly in the first act: the humour, especially, of the early scenes is obscured as a result. Things do pick up after the interval as the protagonists' personal and political crises come to a head. While this is by no means a fatal problem, Myles and his sextet of actors could engage the audience to a greater extent by changing up a gear or two. Jerusalem will not change your life, it won't make a Liberal vote Labor, and it won't make you run out and take up a cause. It will give you some serious food for thought.

THOSE with a taste for attenuated figuration and the medium of bronze should not miss the exhibition of masterworks by Carl Milles at the Ken Done Gallery. The late Swedish-American sculptor, famed for his elegant fountains surmounted by athletic deities, remained loyal to the same mild mid-century Mannerism articulated in Art Deco. Neither an innovator nor a revisionist, Milles placed his faith, which was authentic and considerable, in the credo of high craft. He is perfect for this venue. To June 4.

Gilts? The Sydney Morning Herald Hx) IEEE) SO DDoualbDe Passes tea weira! SADSBOK94 THIS WEEK'S TOP FILMS Fistful of Flies 'Robust and funny; an Australian original. Sandra Hall Betty Blue The Director's Cut "A revelatory additional hour. A sexy, witty, playful and picaresque work of art. Sandra Hall Margaret's Museum "A tough-minded piece with a beguiling sense of place. Sandra Hall Big Night "A delicious movie.

One of the most pleasurable films of the year. Robert Drewe Some Mother's Son "The gifted Mirren Is, as usual, faultless. Robert Drewe .1 it n'K I IT The Sydney Morning Herald and the Sydney Film Festival have 50 double passes to give away for the special night of Spanish Cinema at the State Theatre on Wednesday, June 1 1 from 7pm. "Nobody Will Speak of Us When We Are Dead" The fabulous Victoria Abril in one of her best roles yet, as Gloria, a hopeless drunk and prostitute, pursued to Madrid by two Mexican hitmen. Winner of eight Goya Awards including Best Film, Best Director and Best Actress.

Plus "Mouth to Mouth (Boca a Boca)" A hit at home in Spain, Mouth to Mouth is a Spanish screwball comedy of the 1990s with Javier Bardem (from Jamon, Jamon) as an actor who does phone sex to pay the rent, falling in love with one of his customers. To enter the draw to win, simple phone 0055 214 50 by midnight Saturday, May 31, leaving your name, address and telephone number. Legion Telecall Premium rate maximum call cost 50 cents. A higher rate applies for mobile and public phones. Winners will be notified by mail.

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5.15 p.a. Terms and conditions are available on application. Fees and charges are payable. You know where you stand" with 1 I FILM I 1 1 mmu I Arts Editor Peter Cochrane Deputy Editor Suzy Baldwin Ph 9282 2822 Fax 9282 2481 Advertising Christian Knevrtt Ph 9282 2239 Fax 9282 1748 St.George Bank limited ACN 055 513 070.